'We're sorry'

By Lawrence Korb

Friday

Dec 30, 2011 at 12:01 AMDec 30, 2011 at 6:00 AM

As the U.S. military mission in Iraq ended, it was understandable that the commander in chief, President Barack Obama, and the deputy commander, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, would tell the troops that their sacrifices were not in vain. While that may make some members of the military feel better in the short term about having seen about 4,500 of their colleagues killed and another 32,000 wounded, it ignores the reality of the war and makes it more likely that those who follow in their footsteps will suffer the same consequences. The military and the country would be better off in the long run if Obama and Panetta had given the following speech:

“On behalf of the nation, I would like to apologize to you for the mistakes that were made in the unnecessary invasion of Iraq in 2003. These mistakes were made by all the institutions of government and society, not just the Bush administration.

“There is no doubt that President [George W.] Bush, Vice President [Dick] Cheney, Secretary of State [Colin] Powell, Secretary of Defense [Donald] Rumsfeld, CIA Director [George] Tenet and National Security Adviser [Condoleezza] Rice cooked the books to justify the invasion. They knew or should have known that Saddam [Hussein] was contained and growing weaker by the day and that he did not have weapons of mass destruction or links to Al Qaeda.

“But they are not the only ones to blame. The Congress failed in its responsibilities to provide a check on the executive branch. Too many Republicans wanted to support their president and too many Democrats did not want to appear weak on defense; therefore, the Congress voted overwhelmingly to support this dumb war. Moreover, only a handful of the members took the time to read the classified National Intelligence Estimate, which Sen. Bob Graham (D-Fla.), chairman of the Intelligence Committee, demanded be done before the vote. It is no coincidence that those members who took the time to read the entire NIE voted overwhelmingly against the war. As Sen. Graham noted, reading the entire NIE, not the declassified version, showed that there was no case for war.

“The media, too, failed in its responsibilities. Even good newspapers like The Washington Post and The New York Times parroted the misleading claims of the Bush administration. Finally, many members of the foreign policy elite, including scholars at many think tanks, in order to maintain their connections to government and their ability to obtain future political appointments, also drank the Kool-Aid.

“Your fellow citizens also let you down. They did not demand that their elected representatives pay for the war by enacting a war surtax. Therefore, we borrowed the money to conduct two wars and helped create the massive debt that was one of the factors that created the recession that makes it difficult for you to obtain jobs when you complete your service. You went to war, we went to Walmart.

“But these mistakes did not stop there. Neither the Bush administration nor the civilian and military leaders sent enough troops to control the situation after the fall of Saddam. The administration position was in keeping with the narrative that the war would be easy and that we would be greeted as liberators. But the members of the Joint Chiefs of Staff also let you down by not challenging that assumption and by not supporting their fellow chief, Gen. Eric Shinseki, who told Congress that several hundred thousand troops would be needed to secure Iraq. Nor did they support the commanders in Afghanistan, who said that because of the invasion of Iraq, there would not be enough to finish the job in Afghanistan. As a result, many of you have had — and will continue — to spill your blood much longer than necessary in that country.

“Your military leaders also let you down by not insisting that their civilian bosses in the administration and Congress activate the Selective Service System when it became clear that the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan would drag on for years. As their predecessors told President [Ronald] Reagan in urging him not to end draft registration, the All-Volunteer Force is a peacetime force. Therefore, too many of you were deployed too often to Iraq and Afghanistan without sufficient time at home to recharge. This has resulted in horrible damage to you and your families that will be felt for decades to come. It also meant that many of you had your time in service involuntarily extended through the backdoor draft known as stop-loss.

“The best way to honor the sacrifices that you and your colleagues have made is to say we will not do this again. If America goes to war again, it will be because the threat is imminent, we will have an open and honest debate before sending you into harm’s way, we will send in enough forces to do the job, and the American people will be part of the conflict by paying for it with their increased taxes and by exposing their children and spouses to a draft.

“You did your job and we honor you for it. Please forgive us for not doing ours. Hopefully, next time we will do ours.”

Lawrence Korb, a senior fellow at the Centerfor American Progress, served as assistant secretary of defense inthe Reagan administration.

Editor’s note: This article first appeared onPOLITICO.

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